Twisted Perspectives
by AmberRunnel
Summary: When the Flash loses his powers after an encounter with the Red Death, Dawn and Don Allen take it upon themselves to fix the timeline and restore their father's connection to the speed force. However, when their attempt to travel through time goes awry, they find themselves encountering unlikely allies and realizing that the history they know is twisted beyond perspective.
1. Chapter 1

Dawn sat wordlessly by her father, watching the unmoving readouts from the machine. No matter how much she willed them to change, the result remained the same.

No trace of the speed force. The cure had done its job too well.

Barry Allen was no longer the Flash.

Don sat beside her, her worry etched on his face. "We'll find a way to fix this. Cisco will find a way to get him his powers back."

She clenched her hands, dropping them to rest by her side. "What if we can't, Don? What if the Red Death completes his plan before we can figure it out? We haven't been able to stop him before. Why would anything change now?"

"We haven't been erased from existence," he argued, a half-hearted explanation that wasn't even certain in itself. Maybe they _would _be wiped from the timeline. Changes like that took time.

"Dad still has his powers when we're from. He always did. So we've already failed."

"If we had failed, we'd be dead already."

Dawn looked up suddenly, eyes wide.

"That's your theory look," Don groaned. "What extravagant idea would you suggest we screw up this time?"

"What if he did lose his powers in the original timeline - but never remembered it? What if that timeline, this one we're in right now, was changed?"

"By time travel?"

"Yes!" she exclaimed. "Think about it. Dad loses his powers. We travel back in time to fix that - to create a new timeline where he doesn't. That timeline we create is the one we're from, the one that's supposed to happen. That's why Gideon told us we had to travel back to help them!"

Don thought it over, expression neutral. "One problem. We can't actually travel through time."

"We couldn't before," Dawn said. "But we've been training in the speed lab. We'll just ask Gideon what speed is required to time travel, and fix this ourselves. All we need is a little change. If we hide the cure when the Red Death breaks into the facility, then he'll never find it and never erase Dad's connection to the speed force."

Don looked down at the purple lightning that arced around his fingers. "Let's bounce the idea off Cisco and Caitlin. They can help us."

. . .

"Absolutely not."

"What?" the twins chorused.

To her credit, Iris had listened to their entire plan before handing out her verdict. Unfortunately, both Cisco and Caitlin seemed to agree with her decision.

"Why?" Dawn cried. "We can fix all this. We can give him his powers back!"

"There are too many unknowns," Caitlin explained. "Maybe this is the original timeline, and Barry never told you that he'd lost his powers at one point. We can recreate the accelerator explosion and give him his speed back. We've done it before."

"Yeah, and he almost died," Don argued. "Have you seen the state he's in? Without his healing factor, it'll take him weeks to regain enough health to even survive going through that happy experiment again. By then, who knows how many more people Red Death will have killed?"

"And what if you end up erasing yourselves from the timeline instead?" Cisco challenged, waving his Twizzler around. "It almost happened to me, and trust me, it's not fun. It might even take you longer to learn how to time travel properly then it will for Barry to heal. On top of that, you might be pursued by time wraiths."

"It's a good idea," Iris tried comforting them, but her eyes didn't show much sincerity. "But we simply don't have the knowledge to pull it off."

Dawn cast a look at her brother, and the silent message that passed between them went unnoticed by the others.

Dawn pretended to look downcast. "Okay. I'll think of something else."

Don followed her to the speed lab, and they started running without really thinking about it.

"You think we should go ahead and do it anyway." Don's statement was not a question.

"Yes." Don heard no trace of hesitation, of doubt, in her voice. "We'll consult Gideon. She knows a lot about the timeline. She can help us." A grin spread over her face. "And I found something else. Follow me."

She sped off, still running at superspeed as she darted through the lab and sliding to a stop in the storage room.

Don looked around at the clutter of old suits, stored containers of tech, and stacks of books and clearboards. "You dug something of importance out of this mess?"

"I was poking around," she said earnestly. "And I found a storage drive, like a USB port." She pulled the small item off a metal shelf and showed it to him.

"That's a USB flash drive. What could be so fascinating?"

"It doesn't fit into a USB port. It took me a while of searching, but I finally found how we can access the files. It plugs into the pedestal in the time vault." She sped off.

Don sighed into the silence and followed her.

By the time he'd gotten there, she'd already plugged it in. A list of video files sprung up. "I didn't understand most of the stuff on here, but they were Harrison Well's video logs."

Don frowned as something occurred to him. "Earth Two's Harrison Wells?"

Dawn blinked as if she'd never thought of it. "I suppose."

Don's heart skipped a beat as he saw the time stamp, and couldn't help but take a half-step back. "Dawn, that wasn't Wells. These files are too old."

Dawn blinked a couple of times as she realized what that meant. She only stammered blankly, "That's not good."

Don watched grimly as the video played. "That's Eobard Thawne. The Reverse-Flash."

. . .

Her first reaction was, "That's cool." There was genuine awe in her voice.

Don couldn't help but feel that way as well. To have found actual recordings from the time-traveling speedster that had started this all - the accelerator, meta-humans, the current timeline. Thawne was indirectly responsible for their powers, for all the meta-humans that existed.

However, he could not pass a chance to belittle his sister. "Seriously, Dawn?"

"What?"

"That's Thawne."

"Yeah? It's still cool. Remember, he did help Dad defend S.T.A.R. Labs and build the multi-verse shield to save the universe during the Crisis of Infinite Earths."

"That's one positive. Don't forget the other two hundred negatives."

"Yep, well, it's still cool."

He rolled his eyes and dropped the matter. "Gideon, are we fast enough to travel through time?"

"Based on the latest data from the speed lab, both of you are."

. . .


	2. Chapter 2

For the next couple of days, they did all the research they could. Using Thawne's discoveries (which they didn't really understand at all), Gideon, and each other, they'd come up with a solid plan. They had the exact time, date, and location that would prevent them from running into anyone when they went to hide what was left of the cure.

In theory.

Meanwhile, they pretended that nothing was up when with the rest of the team at S.T.A.R. Labs. Their dad was healing slowly from the beating the Red Death had given him, but he had recovered enough to limp around.

They didn't tell him, either.

Dawn and Don picked an inauspicious day for trouble and waited for everyone to be out of the lab. Then, they finally went into the accelerator chamber.

"Ready?" Dawn asked confidently.

"Ready?" Don shot back, knowing she was less sure of herself than she pretended she was. They were both suited up, both aware of the plan, both on the same page. There was nothing left to do but go.

Matching each other step for step, they started running.

After several momentary laps around the accelerator, they started speeding up. Soon, the accelerator around them faded away, replaced with a rushing blue tunnel. Flashes of images started popping up, but something was wrong. The tunnel seemed to be flickering, turning on itself and disrupting their course.

"Dawn!" he yelled, but his voice was muffled as if he was underwater.

They were running blindly. They'd never get where they were supposed to.

Dawn looked back at him as the blue shifted to gray. In the distance, Don saw what could only be a time wraith - heading straight for her. With a burst of speed, he tackled her sideways, out of the tunnel. Colors blurred in his vision as they crashed onto the ground, rolling for several seconds before crashing to a stop.

Light blurred in his vision as he cracked his eyes open, head pounding. Lying beside him, Dawn was clearly struggling to breathe.

"What did you do?" she coughed. The accusation in her voice was not lost on him.

"What was I doing?" he yelled back. "What were _you _doing? You didn't have a destination in mind - we were running with no direction. In god-damned circles!"

"And you shoved us right out of the time stream!" she retorted. "How are we supposed to go anywhere like that?"

"There was a wraith heading straight for you! I saved your life! Now we could be stuck anywhere in any point in history, and we don't even know how to get back to S.T.A.R. Labs."

"To speak of S.T.A.R. Labs..." Dawn trailed off, looking around. "Where are we?"

They had ended up in a place eerily reminiscent to the accelerator chamber - in fact, it looked almost the same.

Except it wasn't.

This accelerator chamber seemed different, newer, simpler in design. Instead of being in typical semi-darkness, the blue lights were on full brightness. No pipes lined the walls and floors, the anti-cavity chambers they'd repurposed as holding cells were nowhere to be found.

"It's the pipeline..." Don muttered.

"But it's not." Dawn paused to think. "We need to find out what time period you got us stuck in and figure out how to run back before anyone realizes we're from another timeline."

A quiet crackle of lightning preceded the voice that answered his statement. "It's a little too late for that."

They both spun around at the same time, poised for a fight.

The boy who had spoken seemed to be around their age - sixteen or seventeen at most. Yellow lightning flickered around his green and black suit, but he made no move to attack them.

"Who are you?" Dawn asked, still tense. She was unaccustomed to seeing another speedster, much less one their age.

His head tilted ever so slightly "I could ask you the same thing."

Don looked at his sister, voice quiet. "He might be able to help us."

"Stuck in a timeline?" Oddly, the boy's voice sounded hopeful. "I can help you."

Dawn's eyes narrowed. "Right. How convenient."

The boy shrugged. "You were the ones that decided to pop up in a facility that's practically built for time traveling. If you're having problems with wraiths, getting to the correct destination, being chased by a certain murderous speed force demon, and such."

"Black Flash?" Dawn asked skeptically.

"Thankfully, he hasn't been showing up and trying to kill everyone lately."

"Yeah, we know why."

The boy perked up. "Really? Hold up an instance." He pressed a finger to his ear. "Mel, it's safe! They're mostly friendly."

Another speedster darted into the pipeline, looking at them skeptically as she stopped beside him. She had a similar suit, except purple. Her cowl was off, as she clearly didn't bother with hiding who she was.

"Who are you, when are you from, and why are you here?" The blunt tone did not match the bright eyes and deamonor. Mel didn't look intimidating, with her short blonde hair and purple suit, but there was something her voice that was just a little unsettling.

Dawn was not happy with her tone. "Excuse you?"

"Please," Don interrupted.

"They know why the Black Flash is gone," the boy said.

The girl's demeanor changed instantly, from hostile to surprise and simple curiosity. "Really? Why?"

"Well-" Don stammered. "Killer Frost killed him during the reign of Savitar. Reduced him to a pile of ice shards. We're trying to fix a new timeline in which the Flash loses his powers in an encounter with the Red Death."

The boy gave a sigh of relief, while Mel looked up, hostility gone. "Yeah, that's not supposed to happen. Names?"

"Don and Dawn Allen. Who are you two?"

Instantly, both of them tensed. The boy gave Mel a wide-eyed, panicked look.

"You know who we are," Dawn realized, wary once more. "Now who are you?"

Mel's voice was almost challenging when she replied, looking Dawn dead in the eyes, "Meloni and Thaddeus Thawne."


	3. Chapter 3

And that had been enough to turn them against each other, by grudges that were not their own.

Silent looks were exchanged, arguments held in an instant.

Dawn's first thought, really, was not to get away from Meloni and Thaddeus. It was to get out of this timeline. Maybe the Thawne siblings posed no danger, but if Eobard found out that they were here...

Thaddeus saw them about to run, and yelled, "Wait!"

Don stopped, lightning still flickering around his body. Ready to run, ready to flee at any sign of danger. Waiting to see the reason for why Thaddeus had called them back.

"You'll never manage to get back to your time without our help."

"Do you think that matters now?" Dawn shot back. "We're in danger here, regardless of your intentions."

"Our father isn't here," Meloni said quietly. "He won't be back to this time for another fifteen hours at least. We'll still help, you still have time."

Don asked the question he knew his sister was thinking. "Why? Why would you help us?"

Mel looked at her brother, and words failed her.

Thaddeus answered instead. "We don't have a reason why not to."

And it was true.

. . .

"So this really is S.T.A.R. Labs," Don marveled, gazing around the cortex. "It's survived this long."

"Barely," Thaddeus informed him. "It was falling into disrepair, more or less forgotten by the time Dad came back from his first fifteen-year trip to the Flash's timeline. Renovating it accidentally became the family project, and here we are."

"I can't decide whether it looks completely different or almost exactly the same." Dawn's eyes traced every little difference she could pick out. The television screens by the alcove where Flash kept his suit were gone, replaced by flat holograms. One had a map of the city, and the other what looked like an overcomplicated star chart.

Don looked at the peculiar diagram. "That's not a map of the timeline, is it?"

Dawn looked baffled as Mel nodded, looking impressed. "It is."

Thaddeus chortled. "She's surprised that someone from your time could actually recognize it."

"Yeah, well we're not all dim." Don shot a pointed look at his sister that went completely over her head.

"What did the original lab look like?" Thaddeus asked. His face lit up in almost child-like excitement. "Did you use the big clunky screens?"

"I think they're still in the storage room if you want to check," Meloni mumbled, leaning against the counter as she pulled up another timeline map.

Thaddeus darted away as Mel started manipulating the map. "Let us see where your timeline went awry. I need an exact month and year."

As Don started answering Mel's questions, Dawn examined the cortex more carefully. Any second, she expected Eobard Thawne to run in and find them.

A crackle of lightning sounded behind her, and she spun around in alarm.

To find Thaddeus carrying a huge computer in his arms, a big grin on his face.

"Thade, I need your help," Mel called.

Thaddeus gently set down the dust-covered computer before examining the map. Don watched from behind them as they narrowed down the location of the timeline branch. A few speed force symbols occasionally popped up, and they'd record them before moving on.

Upon seeing her brother's hopeful face, Mel sighed. "Fine. Go play with the old computer. I'll decode the symbols. Give me twenty minutes."

"So both of you can read the map and those symbols?" Don asked, peering curiously over Mel's shoulder.

She tilted her head in acknowledgment. "We're learning how. Once we've mastered it, we'll finally be allowed to travel through time."

"But what would you travel through time to do?"

Mel looked at him, eyebrow raised. "The Crisis on Infinite Earths seriously screwed up the timeline, in ways much less superficial than just a rogue timeline branch like the one you two are from. Not only don't we have to fix it, but we're going head to head against the Time Masters, wraiths, and we have to stop any more damage to the timeline."

Don looked at the map again, heart twisting as he was hit with the abrupt realization that the Reverse-Flash wasn't exactly standing on the wrong side of history. The Flash might be remembered as the most powerful speedster, but he was far from it.

"You look conflicted," Mel pointed out.

Don shook his head to clear it. "I've been seeing everything backward."

She didn't look up from her translations. "You wouldn't be the first."

"The Time Masters?" Dawn quipped. "I thought Captain Cold destroyed them all."

"Yeah. He did. But we're dealing with the ones from before they all got blown up. That's the annoying thing about time travel. And they want to keep the time stream as it is, cracked and wavering. They can't get past their narrow-mindedness to realize we're stabilizing the timeline, so they try stopping us instead. But at least..." she paused, and there was a startling break in her voice. "At least we don't have to worry about the Black Flash anymore."

Don knew there was a story behind the grief concealed with relief.

As he watched Meloni's progress, Dawn and Thade were messing around with the old S.T.A.R. Labs computers. They were hilariously slow after years of collecting dust, even by Dawn's standards.

"Hold on, lemme start a timer," Thade joked as the loading bar started inching slowly across the screen.

Dawn grinned, wiping the remained dust off of the screen. "We could even grab some popcorn and watch the screen do absolutely nothing."

"Popcorn?" Thade echoed blankly. "What's popcorn?"

Dawn's eyes went wide. "Oh, no. Popcorn doesn't exist in the future anymore?"

"Apparently not," Thade said. He tapped his wrist, and a small hologram flickered to life. He spoke into it. "Search 'popcorn'".

Several results popped up. Thaddeus speed-read them all before frowning. "Nope. Hasn't been a thing since twenty-seventy." He looked up, mouth pressed into a guilty smile. "You weren't supposed to know that."

"What," Mel teased over her shoulder. "Scared that them knowing the fate of popcorn is going to change the entire timeline?"

"Just to be safe," he warned them, "don't share any of the information you pick up here, however trivial it is. The smallest change can blossom into a disaster."

"We'll keep it in mind," Don said earnestly. "How long do you think it will take before we can go back?"

"Well, once we find the branched timeline and determine how to fix it, we have to actually give you advice on how to end up when and where you want to be. Or else, you could end up at any point in time."

"And might not be so lucky to find help," Don muttered pointedly, giving Dawn an accusing glare.

"I wouldn't call ending up here 'luck'," Thade pondered. "This place has a certain presence in time. Since it's been used for time-traveling so much, it functions as an anchor for anyone who ends up drifting through time."

"Ah, Thade?" Mel called. "We have a problem."


	4. Chapter 4

"What's wrong?" Thade immediately scurried over to his sister, peering at the symbols she had translated and the time chart projected onto the table.

"Look at this." She pointed to a part of the map, and to the several strands that were highlighted.

Lightning flickered behind Thade's eyes as he speed-read the symbols and matched them to the diagram. His voice was genuinely distressed when he protested, "That doesn't make sense! Why wouldn't the change have appeared on the radar of timelines to fix?"

Mel opened her mouth to answer, eyes wide, but didn't have the words yet. Finally, she settled on, "I don't know."

Thade still refused to believe what he was seeing. "That must have been done ages ago! Why hasn't this timeline changed yet?"

Mel looked up. "Gideon, how much longer will it take for the timeline changes to the past to catch up, factoring in the selected timeline branch and the arrival of Dawn and Don Allen?"

"Approximately ten hours after their arrival."

"What?" Dawn asked. "What's going on?"

Mel and Thade stumbled over their words, and each other, to explain. "The destruction of Cicada's dagger created a new, alternate timeline-"

"-and that timeline, without being stabilized, is going to cause major changes to the future, and to this time. The time you're from is a branched timeline, it shouldn't exist. The Flash losing his powers was the first major change, and now the entire timeline is being rewritten."

"But for some reason, it didn't show up on the map as a critical fix, so it was left unattended. And since one of the changes to the timeline was the death of Nora West-Allen, and you two, her timeline alternates, are here-"

"Then the branched timeline will soon set and this day's reality will change. In ten hours, this world will be erased and replaced with a new one."

"Wait, wait, wait," Dawn interrupted. "There's a new timeline about to set?"

"Yes. Since you two are a part of that new, unstabilized timeline, traveling forward exponentially increased the timeline set's acceleration rate. In approximately ten hours, your new timeline will reach us, will reach this time until we stabilize the immediate changes to eliminate a drastic change to the future!"

"Doesn't that mean we have to erase ourselves from existence?" Don asked. "If Nora was supposed to be alive in the original timeline?"

Mel shook her head. "No. Nora wasn't part of the original timeline, you are. But she traveled back to before the start of your timeline, became a time remnant and changed the future. Now, you two just witnessed the first change - the Flash losing his powers. That one consequence is major enough to destroy the entire future."

"But that doesn't explain why Gideon didn't alert us of the incoming time flux," Thade argued, zooming in to the map.

"I know why," Mel said grimly. "It was because Dad initiated the change."

"He did?" Thade asked, confused.

Dawn took up the story. "When he was imprisoned in Iron Heights, he taught Nora how to travel through time. He orchestrated the destruction of Cicada's dagger."

"Then why didn't he know about this?" Thade countered.

Mel had an answer for that as well. "Because Nora was supposed to survive as a time remnant. He tried to save her, and it would have resulted in minor timeline changes that would be easy to fix. But because she died, and team Flash still remembered her, that changed their actions and their mindset. They made different decisions than they would have, and by chance, Flash ended up losing his powers."

"Well, if he lost his powers, why haven't we lost ours?" Dawn asked her.

"The timeline change hadn't yet reached the time you're born in when you traveled to this time. But since you reached this place and accelerated the change, then it now has. If you go back to the past, you'll lose your powers and be erased from existence."

A horrible dread had settled in Dawn's stomach. "We're stuck here." If they went back to their timeline, they would die.

"Thade and I have ten hours until this time is erased and we're stuck too. We need to go back instead of you, make sure the Flash never loses his powers. Then, we track the next major change and fix it too, until the timeline is stabilized and all of us survive."

Thade's voice was quiet, uncertain. "Mel, we should find Dad instead. He'll know the best way to fix this."

Mel looked up pleadingly. "Gideon? Can you contact him?"

"Eobard Thawne is currently offline."

Mel threw her hands up in frustration. "We don't know where he went, this timeline's about to be erased, and Dawn and Don are stuck here because they don't have their powers in the time they're from. Amazing. Critically amazing."

"You have to stabilize the timeline." Don kept his voice steady. "Travel back to Flash's time. We already planned out what was necessary to make sure our Dad never loses his powers. You just have to follow that plan."

Mel suddenly looked uncertain. "We've never time traveled before."

"You can do it. There's no other option."

Thade looked at her sister encouraginly. "Think about it. We fix this timeline, and maybe Dad will let us time travel in the future. Dawn and Don will back us up on comms. They'll tell us what to do."

"You have comms that work through time itself?" Don asked in surprise.

"Gideon," was the only explanation.

Apparently, the A.I. was present throughout all of time.

. . .

"Ready?" Mel asked, poised to run in the pipeline.

"Ready?" Thade shot back.

Watching the monitors from the cortex, Don and Dawn exchanged a knowing smile.

They took off at the same time, matching each other step for step. One lap, two laps, three laps around the pipeline, and they picked up speed. Watching the monitor, Don waited until they had disappeared from view before speaking into the comms. "Remember, focus on when you want to go. On what you aim to do. Picture S.T.A.R. Labs, picture the pipeline and where you'll end up."

Silence.

"We made it," Mel whispered, looking around at the accelerator. It looked so familiar to her, yet completely different. Anti-proton cavities lined the walls, among a vast array of pipes and machinery that she wasn't used to seeing.

"Only Ralph Dibny is currently in the lab. He's most likely watching television in the cortex, but beware - the time vault isn't a safe place to hide in case something goes wrong. If you stay on C level and use the stairs to get to the storage room, you won't run into him. Make sure to hurry, though. The other members of the team might be back at any minute."

"Copy that," Thade whispered. "We're in the stairwell. It's empty."

Lightning crackled as they darted into the storage room.

"This is so weird," Mel muttered. "Everything looks different."

"Your S.T.A.R. Labs feels just as odd to us," Dawn reminded her. "The last few vials of the cure should be in a glass and plastic box by the left wall.

"Found it."

"Get the cure and take it out of the lab," Don said, leaning forward urgently. "The Red Death cannot be allowed to find it."

"The container's locked," Thade informed them. "Do you know the code, or will we have to phase through?"

"Phase through."

Thade carefully vibrated his hand through the glass, grasping the two vials and gingerly removing it from the container. He turned to smile triumphantly at Mel, who was watching with a worried look.

"Let's go," she whispered.

They jumped back as orange lightning crackled into the room.

Mel found herself face to face with the Flash, who demanded, "Who are you?"

. . .

/_Author's note: Did the timeline explanations make sense?_


	5. Chapter 5

Mel immediately stepped in front of her brother, as if to shield him from the Flash. The speedster immediately noticed the vials in his hand. "Leave the vials. Now, I'll ask one more time. Who are you?"

"We can't explain," Thade whispered pleadingly. The Flash's stone-cold look did not change, even after Mel added, "Please. Let us go."

The speedster's voice remained calm, but threateningly so. "Answer my questions."

It took exactly one look from Thade to solidify their decision. Moving as one, both siblings ran off in a storm of yellow lightning.

"Don, what do we do?" Thade yelled. Frozen in shock, Don did nothing. However, Dawn leaned forward and spoke instead, eyes fixed on the motionless screen. "Get to the pipeline. If you can outrun him, make your way back here and dump the cure along the way. If not, then either try to reverse time or grab one of the extrapolators in the cortex and breach to another earth. He won't be able to trace you once you've escaped."

Mel phased right through the wall of the pipeline, dragging her brother with her. Flash followed them right through, but the moment of indecision in which he pondered where to run cost him dearly.

"Thade, cover me! I'm going to reset the timeline!" She'd only used that ability once before, but it was the only option. The timeline had likely already branched, which meant they needed a second chance.

Thade ran along right beside her. "You'll never reach that speed with the Flash dragging at your heels."

She shot him a knowing look as another silent message passed between them.

"Oh."

"That's last resort, okay? Wait for my signal." Mel pulled ahead.

Heart hammering in his chest, Thade looked back. The Flash was gaining with every step, followed by a trail of orange lightning. Thade waited until the speedster reached out to grab him before slamming to a stop, sweeping his foot around to trip him at eight hundred miles an hour.

Thade followed from below as Flash tumbled through the air, hitting the pipeline wall with a dull thud before finally regaining his footing.

"Nice job," Mel commented, panting. "I only need a few more laps." Indeed, her yellow lightning trail was zipping by faster and fast.

Flash ran straight towards Thade. They traded blows before Thade was knocked back, skidding among the ground of the pipeline. Flash was onto him before he even had a chance to stand up, slamming him against the pipeline wall.

Thade's head hit the concrete with a dull thud. Dazed, he fell limply to the ground as Flash dropped him, looking apologetic as he ran after Mel.

"Get up," Mel muttered, "Come on, Thade!"

Thade shook his head to clear it and took off after them. However, he was too slow to accelerate. As Mel passed, she grabbed and pulled him along until they were running side to side. They exchanged nods.

Mel pressed her hand against her lightning emblem. The tachyon drive charged up, glowing in the darkness of the pipeline. Electricity coursed through her body and to the tips of her fingers as she shifted from positive to negative speed force, fingers twitching as she pulled ahead.

When Thade looked at her, his eyes were glowing red.

One more burst of speed was all it took before the world disappeared around them.

"Mel?" Dawn asked into the silence. "Thade? What did you do? What did you do?"

Mel took a deep breath, looking around once more at the empty pipeline. Her voice was forlorn and quiet when she said, "We gave ourselves a second chance."

Thade was still breathing hard, head pounding. He crouched down to avoid falling over


	6. Chapter 6

p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Ralph Dibney peered into the time vault, a mild frown on his face./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"It was empty./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"He stepped farther into the room, confused. He could've sworn he heard the time vault door hiss open. "Gideon?" he asked./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes, Mr. Dibney?" The A.I.'s face shimmered into view. "What can I help you with?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""You didn't happen to see anybody else come this way, did you?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The A.I. paused and gave him a tilted smile./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Of course not."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Hmmph." Dibney cast one last look around before shrugging. "I must be hearing things."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"As soon as the time vault door closed, Mel phased back into visibility, her hand clamped over her brother's mouth. Thade pulled away from her immediately, eyes wide in panic. "You used your powers! Flash will be here any minute now!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Mel only gave him a sly look. Her eyes glowed red as lightning flickered around her body. Voice distorted, she asked him, "According to who?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Don let out a sigh of relief. "Of course. The negative speed force. Quick thinking, Meloni."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Mel," she corrected sharply as she sped out of the time vault. She returned in a flurry of red lightning, holding the two vials of the cure. "Let's go."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade's scared voice stopped her mid-step. "I don't think I can use the negative force."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She brushed a strand of hair out of his face. "You won't have to. By the time Flash senses us, we'll be long gone."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Neither of the Allen twins missed the relief in Thade's voice. "Alright. Let's hurry, then." Don hummed thoughtfully, leaning away from the microphone to talk to his sister in private. "They still have qualms about using red lightning."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I suppose being the children of a negative force speedster does not exempt them of the side effects." Dawn's contempt was aimed at nothing in particular. In fact, Don wouldn't have called it contempt - it almost felt like pity./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The Thawne siblings ran into the cortex, relieved. Mel still had the vials of the cure clutched in a gloved hand. "We did it. We really time traveled."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"A collective, hysteric grin came over Thade's face. "Let's see what's happened to the timeline!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"They raced each other to the timeline map still projected above the counter. Mel quickly isolated the time branch with blurry hands. "The timeline seems to be back on course. This world is intact."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Don tilted his head quizzically. "Surely one change wouldn't have remedied everything?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""The speed force handled the smaller bits. History will automatically course correct, add or subtract time wraiths, if the change was small enough." Thade spun around in his chair./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Thade," Mel said in amused exasperation, shutting off the time map. "You better have your tachyon drive charged up before Dad gets back, or else questions will be asked."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn yawned carelessly, waving a hand towards the pipeline. "So what are you planning on telling him?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Preferably, nothing," Mel said sheepishly. "If he asks, we'll spill the rice. If not, well..."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn gave a spluttering cough. "Did you just say, 'spill the rice'?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She blinked slowly. "Well, yes?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn let her head drop onto the table, giving up completely. "Just...no."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Linguistics is weird," Don commented. "The original phrase was to spill the beans, not the rice. Wonder how the latter came into existence."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Head still on the table, Dawn pointed an accusing finger at him. "Don't make this complicated."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Drop the argument?" Mel asked. "Please. You two need to return to your own time."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""What about a practice time jump together?" Don mumbled. "You two still need to try popcorn."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Mel instantly found herself cornered by three equally pleading gazes. It was her turn to slam her head against the table. "This is such a terrible idea."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"And that was as good as an approval./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Three conversations, a timeline analysis, a last-ditch effort by Mel to convince them otherwise, and they were ready to go. The hardest part had been finding a time without any speedsters to stop them. Before the accelerator explosion was no good, as the Central City was unaccustomed to meta-humans. After that, the Flash, or Kid Flash during Barry's trip to the speed force, had always been around./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"In the end, they decided on the day that the meta-human Farooq had temporarily stolen Flash's speed. Together, the four ran back without incident. Two sets of yellow lightning and two sets of purple appeared in the particle accelerator./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Everyone alright?" Mel whispered./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade, out of breath, only gave a thumbs up. Mel evidently did not understand what it was./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""We still have to be careful, though." Thade said. "Dad might not have had his powers during this time either, but that doesn't render the situation free of danger."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Worse comes to worst, Dawn and I can reverse time," Don reasoned, taking off to phase through the wall of the pipeline./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Mel," Thade whispered. "Mel."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She turned to face him, startled at his dejected tone. "What?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""This version of Dad hasn't seen us in fourteen years."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn drew in a sharp breath as she recalled what exactly had happened to Eobard Thawne when he'd tried to return home. His ancestor had shot himself. He'd been erased from existence./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Don came to stand beside her, clearly following the same depressing line of thought as he quietly told her, "Thawne survives because of Flashpoint. Because Dad tells him what happens to him in this timeline."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""At least he gets to see them again." Dawn turned away, phasing through the pipeline and the wall of the lab until he'd gotten to the deserted parking lot./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Mel and Thade joined them outside, staring up at the city before them. Awe etched on both their faces, neither of them moved for a while. Finally, Mel said, "It looks..."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""...small," Thade finished numbly./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Really?" Dawn teased, face half cast in shadow from the lab behind them. "That's all you can say about it?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Central City," Thade echoed. "looks nothing like Miranda Cal."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""That's what it's called, in the future?" Don looked back at S.T.A.R. Labs. "And the lab survives all of that."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Mel shook her head ruefully. "It really was a monument to time."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The silence stretched until Dawn clapped her hands. "Well, now that we've finished contemplating time and reality's existence, we still need popcorn. We only have a day to show you around the Stone Age, so let's go."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She was the first to run off./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Upon seeing Mel and Thade's baffled glances, Don muttered, "She was never the one for sentimentality."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Yes, I can see that."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;". . ./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"After they spent the day fooling around with the Allen twins and exploring what would eventually become home, Mel pulled Thade aside. "You know what we have to do."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade nodded. "The heart of the matter is convincing Dawn and Don. They won't want to risk the timeline."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""We have to try."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"They returned to the grass where the twins were finishing their ice cream, in the park overlooking the bay and setting sun. Dawn, ever so observant, guessed what they were going to say right off the bat. "You want to talk to your father."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I mean"-Mel threw up her hands in frustration- "he already knows what will happen. Flashpoint gave him a second chance, but..."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""It's still been fourteen years." Don finished her statement, staring absent-mindedly at a ladybug on the grass. "Do you think it will change the timeline?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""So what if it changes the timeline?" Dawn burst out. "We'll fix it if it does."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Don let his head sink. "This is such a terrible idea."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"And that was as good as approval./p 


	7. Chapter 7

_Meanwhile at S.T.A.R. Labs..._

"He runs slow even for a normal person," Cisco commented, looking considerably unimpressed as they watched Barry jog on his treadmill.

"You can't just lose your powers, okay?" Caitlin told Barry as he sat down, breathing hard. "Your DNA was transformed by the particle accelerator blast. There's no way to un-transform DNA."

Barry looked up at her rather skeptically. "Yeah. Tell that to the Uber driver that charged me sixty-five bucks to take me here! I had to tell him I was coming from a cosplay party."

Thawne sat back, head tilted carefully. Of course. He should've realized that immediately. Barry was still a meta-human. The only thing that could possibly change that hadn't been invented yet. He had only lost the ability to draw on his connection to the speed force, so theoretically, an electrical charge of considerate size could bring his powers back.

"Do we think this is temporary?" Barry asked, shoulders hunched as he looked up at Thawne.

Thawne could only give him a barely perceptible shake of the head. "We have to run tests."

Barry nodded bitterly. "Okay."

. . .

"Gideon, show me the future."

"Certainly, Doctor." If the A.I. picked up on the urgency in his voice, she did not show it.

The article that she brought forward confirmed exactly what he had dreaded. Barry's powers were well and truly gone.

_April 25, 2024:_

_Return to Sender: U.S. Post Office Shuts Down Permanently. _

_Red Skies Threaten._

The Crisis on Infinite Earths remained imminent. However, in the current timeline, Barry would never take part in it.

Thawne clamped his hand over his mouth, eyes still locked onto the article. "Run a complete search: Show all references to the Flash."

"Zero references."

"Look again," he snapped.

"Zero references.

"Show any references to Barry Allen."

"Zero references."

"Look again," he roared, clutching the time vault's pedestal.

Gideon sounded as unapologetic as ever. "I've searched three-thousand, four hundred and fifty-two times, Dr. Wells. There's nothing."

Thawne finally stepped back, allowing the A.I. to shut down. This couldn't be how it ended. Fourteen years, he'd spent planning. This couldn't be how it ended.

This couldn't be how it ended.

The screen lit up again, the video feed from one of his cameras overlapping the article. The same meta-human who had stolen Barry's speed was in the lab's garage. "Wells! Let me in!"

Thawne watched him target the generator, absorbing the electricity that powered the lab. Within moments, the lights of the time vault were flickering and fading before plunging him into darkness.

The team regrouped in the cortex, faced with blank computer screens. Barry was talking on the phone as Cisco told Thawne what he had learned. "The meta-human's name is Farooq Gibran. He's trying to break into the lab - and wants to speak to you."

"Joe and Iris are in trouble," Barry interrupted. "I need my powers back, now."

That would prove more complicated than Thawne had initially thought. Not only did they have to deal with the meta-human at their door, but the power was out and there was no guarantee that his idea would work anyways.

What other choice did they have?

And as if Barry only wanted to further complicate the situation, he decided, "I'm going to go talk to him."

"Nope." Thawne's tone left no room for argument, but Barry decided to argue anyways.

"You didn't see him at the sub-station, he needed to feed. I got superspeed out of the particle accelerator blast, but his best friends died and he woke up with a disease!"

Once Barry made up his mind, there was no stopping him.

. . .

Lightning crackled in Farooq's outstretched hands.

"Easy," Barry pleaded. "I'm not going to hurt you."

"You can't hurt me." The meta-human knew he had every advantage. "Where's Harrison Wells?"

"Look, I know what happened to you," Barry explained. "The night of the accelerator explosion, it changed you. It changed me too."

The electricity around Farooq's hands died as he reluctantly lowered his hands, evidently waiting to hear Barry out. "The night of the explosion, when the light hit me, it stopped my heart. Jake and Daria..."

"They were your friends," Barry assumed.

"I woke up and they were beside me, dead." His voice was unhinged, unsteady. "They tried to give me CPR, they were touching me," - an insane grin spread over his face - "I electrocuted them."

Barry could not respond. Hidden behind the doorframe, Caitlin, Cisco, and Dr. Wells could only wait.

"Wells did this to me."

Thawne shook his head. There went their chance.

The desperation in Barry's voice did not go unnoticed, "Farooq, you need to listen to me."

The blast of lightning sent Barry flying, skidding past the door and to the ground. Caitlin ran over to him immediately. As Farooq raised his hands to attack her, too, Cisco darted over to the door panel and locked him out.

. .

Thawne pushed the pipeline door open.

"Come to check on your pet?" Girder yelled, pacing around the cell. "Why don't you just kill me, huh? Get it over with!"

"Quid pro quo," Thawne said deliberately, stepping into the pipeline. "That's Latin, Mr. Woodward. Ever heard of Latin?"

Tony nodded skeptically, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

"Quid pro quo means 'something for something'," Thawne explained. "And that something is your freedom. I'm prepared to grant it to you."

Tony lunged forward, hitting his metal arms against the cell door in a failed effort to intimidate him. "And how do you know I won't kill you?" He asked, pressing his face to the glass.

"Let's call that a calculated risk, one I'm willing to take."

"Really?" Tony was still skeptical, still in disbelief.

Thawne's tone did not change. "That's right."

"Why would you do that?"

"Because," Thawne said, "there is another meta-human loose in this facility. I want you to kill him."

. . .

Thawne studied the restored newspaper headline, scanning for discrepancies as he sorted through the day's events.

Tony Woodward was dead. It had been a necessary sacrifice, but one to regret nonetheless. Had the branched timeline not been remedied soon, Thawne would've likely received a visit from the Black Flash or any number of time wraiths, and his plan was getting complicated enough already.

Ever so often, he would find himself running calculations, trying to change his plan to avoid any more danger to the rest of the team. It scared him how he feared for Barry's life whenever the naive speedster ran into danger. It wasn't because he needed Barry alive for his plan to work, but because he'd genuinely grown to care for him, Cisco, and Caitlin.

Second-guessing was dangerous. Doubting his plan was dangerous. He could not lose sight of his goal.

_But how many people are you willing to sacrifice to get home?_

The answer would've been none had the fate of the future not hung in the balance.

Thawne spun around in alarm as the time vault door hissed open behind him. Before he even saw who it was, he had already processed all the possibilities: Barry, Caitlin, or Cisco could've found the time vault by accident. A future version of himself - or Barry - might've traveled back. The Time Masters might've sent Kronos after him again. None of the options were good.

Instead of another problem, he found the two people he had feared he would never see again.

. . .

I don't feel like I have the talent to actually write their reunion, so here's the setup. If any of you really want to see that scene, then lemme know in the reviews and I'll try my best.

-Amber


	8. Chapter 8

p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn stood in the cortex with her brother, watching her father run throughout the city from the monitors. She exchanged a hidden smile with her brother, looking all too pleased with herself./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"They had fixed an abridged timeline without the Flash's help./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"After parting ways with Mel and Thade, they'd returned to find everything back to normal. Their father still had his powers and the Red Death was lying low for the moment. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Via Gideon, the four remained in close contact. Mel and Thade had taken to fixing small timelines on their own, often retelling their adventures as they worked to keep the secret from their father. A few times, Dawn and Don ran throughout time to join them. It was a delicate balance, avoiding the Flash, Reverse-Flash, past version of Black Flash, Time Masters, time wraiths, and other rogue time travelers. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Fortunately, since they remedied small, almost invisible mistakes, they remained under the radar from just about everything./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The first real danger of discovery came three weeks later./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;" . . ./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Focus," Barry said, watching Dawn run right into the wall once again. "Let the energy flow through your entire body."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn growled in frustration as she picked herself up. "I'm trying." /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""How'd you teach Nora how to phase?" Don asked, brow furrowed as his hand vibrated in and out of focus. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The three speedsters were in the speed lab, holding another practice session. This time, Dawn and Don were trying to learn how to phase, which consisted solely of running face-first into walls./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""It was a life-or-death situation," Barry mumbled, carefully stepping around the full truth. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn immediately picked up on the misleading answer and craftily asked, "How did emyou /emlearn how to phase?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"No avoiding that one. "Thawne taught me," he admitted. "I borrowed his technique to teach Nora."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn gave her brother a startled glance and didn't reply./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Cisco's voice came over the speaker. "We need you in the cortex, Barry!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"All three speedsters were there at once. "What's up?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Call one speedster, get two more free," Cisco quickly muttered to himself before pointing at the monitor. "That's up." The screen was showing the camera view into the pipeline, which currently featured a wormhole right in the center of the accelerator chamber./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Oh, that's not good," Barry muttered. He was suited up within a moment./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The time breach twisted in on itself as they waited. Three figures fell through, crashing to the ground and tumbling across the accelerator chamber. One was a time wraith, the other two were Mel and Thade./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn drew in a sharp breath, looking at her brother with wide eyes. Without hesitation, they followed their father into the pipeline as Mel and Thade tried to get away from the wraith that had followed them through the breach./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry dove at the wraith, knocking it away from them. It shrieked and ran after him instead, arms latching around his neck. He gasped as his face started withering, gray cracks spreading along his skin from contact with the creature./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn gave an equally unsettling screech and punched right through the wraith, a distraction that did its job too well. As his sister played tag with the creature, Don ran to Mel. "Are you alright?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She shuddered, face pallid as she whispered, "I think my leg is broken. What about Thade?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""He's fine," Don promised, voice dropping as Frost joined the battle around the pipeline. "He's helping Dawn. I'll get you out of here."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Mel hissed in pain as he picked her up, eyes visibly wide through her cowl. Setting her down on the med-bay's cot, Don yelled to Cisco, "We've got one injured!"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Cisco relayed the message. "Frost, we might need Caitlin."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""A little busy!" Frost hissed, a stream of ice bursting from her hand as she tried to hit the wraith flying around her. Barry ran in a small circle before lightning flickered from his hands and hit the wraith. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Ice and lightning took its toll, dissolving the creature to ash. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry slammed to a stop in a crackle of lightning by one of the speedsters that had come through the wormhole. "Are you alright?" /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade nodded quietly as Dawn stopped beside her father. "The other one's hurt," she told him. "In the med-bay."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Caitlin's hair faded back to brown. "Mind giving me a ride, Flash?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"The team regrouped in the med-bay as Caitlin treated Mel's leg. "It's broken alright."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Mel nodded wordlessly, still staring at the Flash in equal awe and uncertainty./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""What happened?" Dawn asked, trying to keep too much concern out of her voice. She couldn't drop any hints that she knew Mel and Thade./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""We were traveling back in time," Thade said simply, sitting against the wall. All five speedsters were still suited up, clearly keeping secret identities secret. "A wraith got in the way."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""That's always annoying," Barry muttered to himself, still wary. "Are you both from the future? What are your names?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade looked at his sister warily./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""We can't reveal too much," Mel apologized./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Out of risk to the timeline," Barry finished. "I understand."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn tried to relax, but she could not. If her father asked Gideon who they were, he would get an answer. And that answer would have consequences, whether or not the Flash took the news well./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Well, you're welcome to stay here until you're both healed," Caitlin said kindly, looking through the scans she had taken. "Hopefully we won't get too many visits from wraiths."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade bowed his head. "Thank you."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry frowned upon seeing the look Mel was giving him. "Why are you looking at me like that?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""I mean..." Mel stammered. "You're the Flash."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry smiled at the shy uncertainty in her voice. "My reputation precedes me."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Right. Especially since he'd attacked them the other time Mel had seen him. This version of the Flash didn't remember that encounter, as that timeline had been reset, but it was the same person nonetheless./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Cisco snorted. "Course it does, you're practically a legend by now. I'mma configure the satellite to look for any of our dementor friends. Can I have a word, Flash?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry followed him out into the cortex, voice dropping so that he wouldn't be overheard. "You, too?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""What, that I feel like I've met them before?" Cisco replied, sitting down at his desk. "Wouldn't have called you here otherwise. I was hoping this was an alternate timeline sorta thing that my powers picked up a while ago, but that can't be it if you can't place it as well."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry looked at the speedsters through the glass, brow furrowed. "It's really bothering me."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Don't try too hard, man," Cisco advised. "Wouldn't want to screw up time again. That's asking for trouble. Even if I still had my powers, I wouldn't vibe them."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Barry nodded, leaning against the table. "I know. There's something off about them, but I don't know what it is."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Are you going to try to find out?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;". . ./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Once the med-bay was empty, Mel finally spoke up. "That went better than I expected."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Don shrugged. "Dad isn't hostile. Last time's fiasco was purely because he caught you breaking into the lab. So what happened?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade shrugged helplessly. "I do not know. We were traveling to fix a small mistake. The wraith shouldn't have interfered unless we were meant to arrive here."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Just as we were meant to arrive in your time, three weeks ago," Don mused. "We're still following the correct timeline. All that's left is for you to heal and go back, assuming nothing else goes wrong."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade gave him a troubled look. "I do hope that. I wouldn't want to be anywhere near this timeline if Flash finds out who we are."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Don was startled by the fear in Thade's voice, however casually he played it off. When he thought about it, he realized Thade might see the Flash as a villain just like Don saw Eobard Thawne as one. Although Don would admit that he now had trouble believing the few twisted scraps of information about the Reverse-Flash displayed in the Flash museum. His entire time saw the story from a twisted, one-sided perspective. The truth was buried under years' worth of hatred./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"It was odd for him to wrap his head around, that the entire team had no idea that the Reverse-Flash was restoring the timeline and fixing the damage from the Crisis of Infinite Earths./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Flash defended reality, Reverse-Flash defended time./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Dawn smiled tightly. "We'd stop Flash from doing anything too overly reckless."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Thade gave her a teasing look. "Reckless? Who exactly is talking right now?"/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She glared at him as Don giggled./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;""Don't make me laugh," Mel said through gritted teeth. "It's giving me a headache."/p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"They fell into silence./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Several hours later, and Dawn still hadn't gotten used to seeing the Thawne siblings in the cortex of 2020's S.T.A.R. Labs. Never mind seeing her father talking to them with no trace of hostility. /p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"She crossed her fingers as they started circling the accelerator chamber, picking up speed with every lap. No wraiths showed up to disrupt their course, not even when the wormhole opened and they disappeared./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"As soon as the team had finished debriefing, Dawn and Don darted into the time vault to message Mel and Thade, checking to make sure they had made it back safely. Dawn's heart twisted when they received no immediate reply, but the next day gave them an answer./p  
p style="font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"Nothing else had gone wrong./p 


End file.
